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Mister Wonderful: A Love Story
Goodreads Choice Award
Nominee for Readers' Favorite Graphic Novels & Comics (2011)The fan-favorite Eisner Award-winning story, originally serialized in The New York Times Magazine, now collected and with forty pages of new material.
Meet Marshall. Sitting alone in the local coffee place. He’s been set up by his friend Tim on a blind date with someone named Natalie, and now he’s just feeling set up. She’s nine minutes late and counting. Who was he kidding anyway? Divorced, middle-aged, newly unemployed, with next to no prospects, Marshall isn’t exactly what you’d call a catch. Twenty minutes pass.
A half hour. Marshall orders a scotch. (He wasn’t going to drink!) Forty minutes.
Then, after nearly an hour, when he’s long since given up hope, Natalie appears — breathless, apologizing profusely that she went to the wrong place. She takes a seat, to Marshall’s utter amazement.
She’s too good to be true: attractive, young, intelligent, and she seems to be seriously engaged with what Marshall has to say. There has to be a catch.
And, of course, there is.
During the extremely long night that follows, Marshall and Natalie are emotionally tested in ways that two people who just met really should not be. Not, at least, if they want the prospect of a second date.
A captivating, bittersweet, and hilarious look at the potential for human connection in an increasingly hopeless world, Mister Wonderful more than lives up to its name.
Meet Marshall. Sitting alone in the local coffee place. He’s been set up by his friend Tim on a blind date with someone named Natalie, and now he’s just feeling set up. She’s nine minutes late and counting. Who was he kidding anyway? Divorced, middle-aged, newly unemployed, with next to no prospects, Marshall isn’t exactly what you’d call a catch. Twenty minutes pass.
A half hour. Marshall orders a scotch. (He wasn’t going to drink!) Forty minutes.
Then, after nearly an hour, when he’s long since given up hope, Natalie appears — breathless, apologizing profusely that she went to the wrong place. She takes a seat, to Marshall’s utter amazement.
She’s too good to be true: attractive, young, intelligent, and she seems to be seriously engaged with what Marshall has to say. There has to be a catch.
And, of course, there is.
During the extremely long night that follows, Marshall and Natalie are emotionally tested in ways that two people who just met really should not be. Not, at least, if they want the prospect of a second date.
A captivating, bittersweet, and hilarious look at the potential for human connection in an increasingly hopeless world, Mister Wonderful more than lives up to its name.
77 pages, Hardcover
First published April 12, 2011
10 people are currently reading
1390 people want to read
About the author
Daniel Clowes
105 books1,900 followersDaniel Clowes is an American cartoonist, graphic novelist, illustrator, and screenwriter whose work helped define the landscape of alternative comics and bring the medium into mainstream literary conversation. Rising to prominence through his long-running anthology Eightball, he used its pages to blend acidic humor, social observation, surrealism, and character-driven storytelling, producing serials that later became acclaimed graphic novels including Like a Velvet Glove Cast in Iron, Ghost World, David Boring, Ice Haven, and Patience. His illustrations have appeared in major publications such as The New Yorker, Vogue, and The Village Voice, while his collaborations with filmmaker Terry Zwigoff resulted in the films Ghost World and Art School Confidential, the former earning widespread praise and an Academy Award nomination for its screenplay. Clowes began honing his voice in the 1980s with contributions to Cracked and with his Lloyd Llewellyn stories for Fantagraphics, but it was Eightball, launched in 1989, that showcased the full range of his interests, from deadpan satire to psychological drama. Known for blending kitsch, grotesquerie, and a deep love of mid-century American pop culture, he helped shape the sensibilities of a generation of cartoonists and became a central figure in the shift toward graphic novels being treated as serious literature. His post-Eightball books continued this evolution, with works like Wilson, Mister Wonderful, The Death-Ray, and the recent Monica exploring aging, identity, longing, and the complexities of relationships, often through inventive visual structures that echo the history of newspaper comics. Clowes has also been active in music and design, creating artwork for Sub Pop bands, the Ramones, and other artists, and contributing to film posters, New Yorker covers, and Criterion Collection releases. His work has earned dozens of honors, including multiple Harvey and Eisner Awards, a Pen Award for Outstanding Body of Work in Graphic Literature, an Inkpot Award, and the prestigious Fauve d’Or at Angoulême. Exhibitions of his original art have appeared across the United States and internationally, with a major retrospective, Modern Cartoonist: The Art of Daniel Clowes, touring museums beginning in 2012. His screenplay work extended beyond Ghost World to projects like Art School Confidential and Wilson, and he has long been a touchstone for discussions about Generation X culture, alternative comics, and the shifting boundaries between the literary and graphic arts.
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Displaying 1 - 30 of 326 reviews
August 30, 2014
Mister Wonderful is the story of Marshall, a damaged divorcee meeting another damaged divorcee in a coffee shop on a blind date. The book covers their evening, taking in their awkward first encounter, and their brief misadventures from there. It's nothing too dramatic – it is Dan Clowes! - but I don't want to give away the whole story here as it's quite a short book.
If you've read Clowes before you'll be familiar with the characters - neurotic, nervous, awkward people struggling with basic things like polite conversation and self-expression. Marshall and his date are the same, Clowes-ian characters you've seen before in his other books like Ghost World, Caricature, Ice Haven, etc.
While the book is a decent read, it's very much like Clowes' previous work and doesn't really do anything different to stand out from them. It's not as funny as "Wilson" but is interesting enough to make it worth checking out if you enjoy indie comics. Comparatively though, he’s done better and the book is about as close to a cookie-cutter Clowes book as you could get.
If you've read Clowes before you'll be familiar with the characters - neurotic, nervous, awkward people struggling with basic things like polite conversation and self-expression. Marshall and his date are the same, Clowes-ian characters you've seen before in his other books like Ghost World, Caricature, Ice Haven, etc.
While the book is a decent read, it's very much like Clowes' previous work and doesn't really do anything different to stand out from them. It's not as funny as "Wilson" but is interesting enough to make it worth checking out if you enjoy indie comics. Comparatively though, he’s done better and the book is about as close to a cookie-cutter Clowes book as you could get.
July 20, 2014
A short and embarrassingly honest look at the love life (mostly lack thereof) of two intelligent but emotionally hung-up and overwhelmingly self-depreciative people. After all, who wants to worry themselves with dating when its clear that you are the worst person ever to waste this world and everyone else's time? Daniel Clowes gets alienation, loneliness and awkwardness, though who the hell is happy with being able too admit that they can relate with lifelong feelings of inadequacy?
February 23, 2016
Neurotisch und witzig wie Wood Allen in seinen besten Zeiten, und ich liebe Clowes Zeichnungen!
Dazu das ungewöhnliche Format, das er für tolle Breitwandeffekte nutzt: für mich ein klares 5-Sterne-Comic, auch wenn ich damit preisgebe, dass melancholische Geschichten über wehleidige einsame Männer in der Midlife-Krise mich ansprechen - - - jedenfalls, wenn Clowes sie erzählt.
Dazu das ungewöhnliche Format, das er für tolle Breitwandeffekte nutzt: für mich ein klares 5-Sterne-Comic, auch wenn ich damit preisgebe, dass melancholische Geschichten über wehleidige einsame Männer in der Midlife-Krise mich ansprechen - - - jedenfalls, wenn Clowes sie erzählt.
April 10, 2018
I loved it. this is a heartwarming comic on second chances, on neuroses and peculiar intimacies with loneliness. Brilliant. Well told and relatable. Marshall and Natalie aren't any version of a love story we'd love to become, but it's not the worst thing in the world to be as authentically themselves as they are.
March 7, 2018
Overall, a boring story. I despise the main character so much that I was hoping he got hit by a bus at some point.
February 22, 2017
3.5
Recommended for people who like reading conversations (more like monologues). This reminds so much of Woody Allen's way of talking.
The art is catchy ... and was the reason for picking it up... and will be the reason for reading more by Daniel Clowes.
What I loved:
The presentation! The way dialogues were garbled out to lay emphasis on monologues. Very nicely portrayed.
Funny dialogues.
The few pages where the frames expanded horizontally from left to right, it was a delight.
What I didn't like:
Wish it was not that short :(
Recommended for people who like reading conversations (more like monologues). This reminds so much of Woody Allen's way of talking.
The art is catchy ... and was the reason for picking it up... and will be the reason for reading more by Daniel Clowes.
What I loved:
The presentation! The way dialogues were garbled out to lay emphasis on monologues. Very nicely portrayed.
Funny dialogues.
The few pages where the frames expanded horizontally from left to right, it was a delight.
What I didn't like:
Wish it was not that short :(
January 20, 2023
This 2011 graphic novel about a blind date feels somewhat "dated" 12 years after it was created. The drawing is excellent, in the usual flat, matter-of-fact Clowes style, and the dialog is priceless - capturing the protagonist (Marshall) eternally self-defeating second-guessing, his unending neurotic interior monologue. The date (Natalie) is similarly "damaged" but in a different way; mutual friends have set up the date thinking they might be perfect for each other. To say more in a review would spoil the book for any readers of this review.
Although the book is only 12 years old, the intervening years seem to have changed everything around, starting of course with the pandemic and the effects on interactions etc. Also, I am 12 years older, seem to be less into graphic novels in general these days, 2011 happened to have been the year in which I was laid off and my "active" or "daily" involvement with the world more or less ended (i.e. no need to commute to work, see people at work, etc). At that age, and in that post 2008 economic environment, with unemployment still at double-digits, I was essentially forced to retire permanently when I was laid off. Luckily, things turned out OK after all and I can't complain about how life turned out in this most recent stage of my life, which is indeed more focused on "retiring" as in "sleeping" than ever before. Still, with time to consider and think, you may consider what books say differently at different stages of your life. I found myself reading "Mister Wonderful" with a sense of nostalgia - looking back at a world that at least for me is long gone. The world of coffee shops, the struggle to make ends meet, the worry about impressing people etc. I still of course want to make a good impression but I feel I'm sort of past the never-ending social game, all that it involved, once upon a time. I've not only accepted my rather more "reduced" or "ascetic" existence but perhaps prefer it by now. Consumerism was part of that world and consuming mindlessly is now far, far in the past. Now, the watchword is practicality and frugality. It's not easy to exactly say what changed so much since 2011 - the times certainly changed. In 2011 there was no inkling that a political cataclysm would shake the US in 4 years time, with the 2015 announcement by Donald Trump that he was running for president, and the years - now 8 years - of subsequent socio-political craziness. 2011 was post-2008 and may have been about mass dislocation and unemployment, and Occupy, but it was still possible to take events seriously, the narrative hadn't completely gone off the rails, such that masses of people as well as score of politicians have adopted a myth of a stolen? victorious? election as reality. Almost as if that fiction has become the kernel of a new transcendent belief - real for some millions, but lacking reality for other millions. Indeed, the pandemic ended up dividing the population in similar ways: Some didn't take it seriously, refused to mask up or take the vaccines. Others followed the recommendations issued by the medical establishment. Yet thousands of people from both groups ended up getting sick, some very sick, some dying. As bad as things were in 2011 - the post crash years - they veered into sickening unreality became positively beyond belief since then. The prevailing sense that people have been lied to by the establishment, by cynical political demagogues, about everything to lesser or greater extents- that was largely missing in 2011. Looking back at that world, seems a bit quaint in light of the subsequent upheavals. Marshall and Natalie wrapped up in their loneliness, trying to establish a relationship - all well and good, because the framework of society hadn't yet fallen apart, despite the economic crash. There hadn't been a pandemic, lock down, shutdown of non-essential businesses and schools, and so forth. The paranoia about the virus wasn't the central concern - politics hadn't degenerated into a frenzied light opera dominated by a man with the selfish mentality of a spoiled adolescent. The George Floyd murder hadn't occurred, cities and polities were still intact, and the subsequent crime spike hadn't occurred. Perhaps things seemed more "normal" in 2011 because Obama was still president - "No Drama Obama."
It is over ten years since this book was written - maybe every decade represents an era from invariably which shapes us. The post JFK assassination era was one such era, of social turmoil, in the 1960s through the 1970s. Perhaps it is silly to think one era is "calmer" or "saner" than another - perhaps all eras have their ups and downs. Still, it seems to me that things have flown apart, disintegrated, since 2015, more so even than after the 2008 crash. The rise of Trump raises more questions than anyone can answer - even though he did lose his re-election bid in 2020, he still remains the most powerful figure in the GOP. Academics whose views were shaped by the matter-of-fact, predictable thinking of academia, remain stumped by the rise of Trump. And especially how Trump can retain his popularity and power within the GOP, after obviously repeatedly professing falsehoods about the election for over two years. Does that mythos - of a lost election - represent some sort of replacement religion for millions, in the era of a general loss of faith, declining adherence to religion and even declining civic engagement? Is it one of the few things some people have to share in common, especially in an era of work from home, shop from home, etc.?
In any event, the book, now 12 years old, concerned with interpersonal relations/loneliness, and for me, now at least ten years after I've retired from the "rat race" - it seemed a quaint story of a less troubled time. A nostalgic look back at a time when society seemed more cohesive, less fragmented, stressed-out etc. Still, I would recommend the book - it contains a number of laugh-out-loud passages, and is a mood-lifter in general.
Although the book is only 12 years old, the intervening years seem to have changed everything around, starting of course with the pandemic and the effects on interactions etc. Also, I am 12 years older, seem to be less into graphic novels in general these days, 2011 happened to have been the year in which I was laid off and my "active" or "daily" involvement with the world more or less ended (i.e. no need to commute to work, see people at work, etc). At that age, and in that post 2008 economic environment, with unemployment still at double-digits, I was essentially forced to retire permanently when I was laid off. Luckily, things turned out OK after all and I can't complain about how life turned out in this most recent stage of my life, which is indeed more focused on "retiring" as in "sleeping" than ever before. Still, with time to consider and think, you may consider what books say differently at different stages of your life. I found myself reading "Mister Wonderful" with a sense of nostalgia - looking back at a world that at least for me is long gone. The world of coffee shops, the struggle to make ends meet, the worry about impressing people etc. I still of course want to make a good impression but I feel I'm sort of past the never-ending social game, all that it involved, once upon a time. I've not only accepted my rather more "reduced" or "ascetic" existence but perhaps prefer it by now. Consumerism was part of that world and consuming mindlessly is now far, far in the past. Now, the watchword is practicality and frugality. It's not easy to exactly say what changed so much since 2011 - the times certainly changed. In 2011 there was no inkling that a political cataclysm would shake the US in 4 years time, with the 2015 announcement by Donald Trump that he was running for president, and the years - now 8 years - of subsequent socio-political craziness. 2011 was post-2008 and may have been about mass dislocation and unemployment, and Occupy, but it was still possible to take events seriously, the narrative hadn't completely gone off the rails, such that masses of people as well as score of politicians have adopted a myth of a stolen? victorious? election as reality. Almost as if that fiction has become the kernel of a new transcendent belief - real for some millions, but lacking reality for other millions. Indeed, the pandemic ended up dividing the population in similar ways: Some didn't take it seriously, refused to mask up or take the vaccines. Others followed the recommendations issued by the medical establishment. Yet thousands of people from both groups ended up getting sick, some very sick, some dying. As bad as things were in 2011 - the post crash years - they veered into sickening unreality became positively beyond belief since then. The prevailing sense that people have been lied to by the establishment, by cynical political demagogues, about everything to lesser or greater extents- that was largely missing in 2011. Looking back at that world, seems a bit quaint in light of the subsequent upheavals. Marshall and Natalie wrapped up in their loneliness, trying to establish a relationship - all well and good, because the framework of society hadn't yet fallen apart, despite the economic crash. There hadn't been a pandemic, lock down, shutdown of non-essential businesses and schools, and so forth. The paranoia about the virus wasn't the central concern - politics hadn't degenerated into a frenzied light opera dominated by a man with the selfish mentality of a spoiled adolescent. The George Floyd murder hadn't occurred, cities and polities were still intact, and the subsequent crime spike hadn't occurred. Perhaps things seemed more "normal" in 2011 because Obama was still president - "No Drama Obama."
It is over ten years since this book was written - maybe every decade represents an era from invariably which shapes us. The post JFK assassination era was one such era, of social turmoil, in the 1960s through the 1970s. Perhaps it is silly to think one era is "calmer" or "saner" than another - perhaps all eras have their ups and downs. Still, it seems to me that things have flown apart, disintegrated, since 2015, more so even than after the 2008 crash. The rise of Trump raises more questions than anyone can answer - even though he did lose his re-election bid in 2020, he still remains the most powerful figure in the GOP. Academics whose views were shaped by the matter-of-fact, predictable thinking of academia, remain stumped by the rise of Trump. And especially how Trump can retain his popularity and power within the GOP, after obviously repeatedly professing falsehoods about the election for over two years. Does that mythos - of a lost election - represent some sort of replacement religion for millions, in the era of a general loss of faith, declining adherence to religion and even declining civic engagement? Is it one of the few things some people have to share in common, especially in an era of work from home, shop from home, etc.?
In any event, the book, now 12 years old, concerned with interpersonal relations/loneliness, and for me, now at least ten years after I've retired from the "rat race" - it seemed a quaint story of a less troubled time. A nostalgic look back at a time when society seemed more cohesive, less fragmented, stressed-out etc. Still, I would recommend the book - it contains a number of laugh-out-loud passages, and is a mood-lifter in general.
August 29, 2021
Spend a depressing evening with Marshall as he goes on a blind date with Natalie. You get to hear not only their dialogue, but Marshall's thoughts as he frets and dithers. They seemed a pretty hopeless and unhappy couple to me, but I wish 'em all the best.
September 10, 2011
Clowes returns to form after the disappointing experiment of Wilson. MR. WONDERFUL is equally experimental (in form I mean - story-wise, like WILSON, it's straight ahead Clowes territory), continuing the fascination with comic strip presentation formats begun with Ice Haven and examining how they affect storytelling. Here, in work originally serialized in THE NEW YORK TIMES MAGAZINE and online (which I started at the time, but never kept up with) we get a limited panel, horizontal structure which, like WILSON, is keyed around the idea of an ongoing story that terminates each week with a cliffhanger panel. Can you tell a thorough (if not particularly complicated), modern story in such a format?
WILSON ambitiously attempted to sketch out a man's entire life (albeit, the life of a schmuck) and while it succeeded in format,the subject matter, I believe, sunk it. Here, the attempt is to capture all the psychological nuances of the beginnings of a modern relationship between middle-aged, somewhat damaged (although not as damaged as they think) people. The trademark wry, dry Clowes humor is here (I specifically laughed out loud at the typical Clowesian response from the Homeless guy our hero previously punched out and now tries to reconcile with), as is the cynicism and self-deprecation bordering on self-loathing and the eye for subtle, human detail in action, language and thought. And yet, there's a lighter touch here (perhaps influenced by the original appearance location or perhaps just because Clowes has mellowed a little with age) that makes this book a winner compared to WILSON, if perhaps not a grand masterpiece story-wise. It IS a definite success in the structural experiment - a well-thought out manipulation of form are the thought balloons that obscure the spoken word balloons and some of the single-panel, double-page spreads are oddly humorous (the enormous car sound effect to signal our switch to an automobile) while others are striking in their impact (I'm thinking in particular of the spread of our main character walking home through dark, deserted streets lit only by cold neon signs - not only is it a beautiful piece of composition and color choice, it also hearkens back to the iconography of Clowes' early work on the 50's comedy noir magazine LLOYD LLEWELLYN (collected in Manly World of Lloyd Llewellyn) and I would love to have a poster of it, or the original artwork, on my wall.
So, after the disappointing, uneven, bitter WILSON, Clowes hits a solid grounder and gets to second.
WILSON ambitiously attempted to sketch out a man's entire life (albeit, the life of a schmuck) and while it succeeded in format,the subject matter, I believe, sunk it. Here, the attempt is to capture all the psychological nuances of the beginnings of a modern relationship between middle-aged, somewhat damaged (although not as damaged as they think) people. The trademark wry, dry Clowes humor is here (I specifically laughed out loud at the typical Clowesian response from the Homeless guy our hero previously punched out and now tries to reconcile with), as is the cynicism and self-deprecation bordering on self-loathing and the eye for subtle, human detail in action, language and thought. And yet, there's a lighter touch here (perhaps influenced by the original appearance location or perhaps just because Clowes has mellowed a little with age) that makes this book a winner compared to WILSON, if perhaps not a grand masterpiece story-wise. It IS a definite success in the structural experiment - a well-thought out manipulation of form are the thought balloons that obscure the spoken word balloons and some of the single-panel, double-page spreads are oddly humorous (the enormous car sound effect to signal our switch to an automobile) while others are striking in their impact (I'm thinking in particular of the spread of our main character walking home through dark, deserted streets lit only by cold neon signs - not only is it a beautiful piece of composition and color choice, it also hearkens back to the iconography of Clowes' early work on the 50's comedy noir magazine LLOYD LLEWELLYN (collected in Manly World of Lloyd Llewellyn) and I would love to have a poster of it, or the original artwork, on my wall.
So, after the disappointing, uneven, bitter WILSON, Clowes hits a solid grounder and gets to second.
May 6, 2011
I laughed harder at this book than anything I've read in years.
It's so heartbreaking and hilarious, and the artwork is some of Clowes's Best. My favorite new inventive element was the way he slapped squares of character thoughts directly over the dialogue, thus creating an inner monologue that trumped what was actually being said. Think of that moment in Annie Hall with the subtext in subtitles. This was similar, except the thoughts actually blocked out the dialogue, so that only a few sorry dialogue words could peek around the edges, trying to find some oxygen. The effect was a character so interior, so obsessed about making some kind of humiliating mistake that his inner monologue had destroyed his ability to fully engage in a conversation.
Self-consciousness has been taken to a new level here. With Wilson, his last book, it seemed more rooted in a toxic kind of narcissism. This time around it comes from a more palatable form of desperation. Our hero really believes he might never find romantic love in any form again, and he'll do just about anything to make sure his last shot does not elude him. For instance, he will totally punch a hobo.
The only reason I didn't give this 5 stars is that I wish it were longer. But it already took him 4 years to write this. Apparently, I'm just greedy.
It's so heartbreaking and hilarious, and the artwork is some of Clowes's Best. My favorite new inventive element was the way he slapped squares of character thoughts directly over the dialogue, thus creating an inner monologue that trumped what was actually being said. Think of that moment in Annie Hall with the subtext in subtitles. This was similar, except the thoughts actually blocked out the dialogue, so that only a few sorry dialogue words could peek around the edges, trying to find some oxygen. The effect was a character so interior, so obsessed about making some kind of humiliating mistake that his inner monologue had destroyed his ability to fully engage in a conversation.
Self-consciousness has been taken to a new level here. With Wilson, his last book, it seemed more rooted in a toxic kind of narcissism. This time around it comes from a more palatable form of desperation. Our hero really believes he might never find romantic love in any form again, and he'll do just about anything to make sure his last shot does not elude him. For instance, he will totally punch a hobo.
The only reason I didn't give this 5 stars is that I wish it were longer. But it already took him 4 years to write this. Apparently, I'm just greedy.
August 27, 2011
Clowes is gently mellowing from caustic misanthrope into a relatively gentler, cranky next door neighbor ("Get off my lawn, you damn kids with your cellular devices and youtubes!"). The self-loathing and misanthropy are still present but more restrained. He may be maturing, cashing in, or getting slighter in his offerings, but this short-story turned "graphic novel" via double-page spreads for every fourth panel works decently. And yet the format reminds me of Memories of My Melancholy Whores (i.e. a talented writer runs out of steam on his last book. So the publisher adjusts the font size and spacing as far as they can go in order to turn a short work into a "novel").
April 26, 2011
Eh. This was another lackluster attempt. A couple bits of funny dialog, but overall there wasn't much here, and what is here is overly familiar and unexciting. Better than Wilson, but what isn't.
I've been re-thinking Clowes lately - I can't imagine myself going back and re-reading Ghost World with much enjoyment, and maybe Like A Velvet Glove... would seem a bit dated? But there used to be SOMETHING there, right? Whatever it was that kept me looking forward to the semi-annual issues of Eightball? Maybe it's more that he's the same and I'm different, but he really hasn't done much in forever (except the Death Ray) that I thought was worth even remembering.
I've been re-thinking Clowes lately - I can't imagine myself going back and re-reading Ghost World with much enjoyment, and maybe Like A Velvet Glove... would seem a bit dated? But there used to be SOMETHING there, right? Whatever it was that kept me looking forward to the semi-annual issues of Eightball? Maybe it's more that he's the same and I'm different, but he really hasn't done much in forever (except the Death Ray) that I thought was worth even remembering.
October 19, 2019
Sì, d'accordo, la storia d'amore di mezza età c'è ma siamo sempre in territorio Clowes e dunque non mancano, nell'ordine, lo sfigato irrecuperabile, la disadattata strafatta di anfetamine e zoccola, la bulimica che non può avvicinarsi all'ex per via di una certa ordinanza restrittiva e il perfido senzatetto: in poche parole la migliore umanità concepibile per un racconto illustrato del secondo decennio del ventunesimo secolo.
December 28, 2011
i think this might be the second comic book i ever read. it was fun. i'll read more.
but since i'm a neophyte, i have no way of measuring this against others, so all i can say is that it was fun and i enjoyed it.
but since i'm a neophyte, i have no way of measuring this against others, so all i can say is that it was fun and i enjoyed it.
April 28, 2011
Loved it! Especially the meta-comics mixed in to the narrative.
My only complaint was that it was too short! More Clowes=better.
My only complaint was that it was too short! More Clowes=better.
May 21, 2018
After the Clowes-lite Box Office Poison left me a bit cold, I had a hankering for the real thing. I thought I might have some unread Daniel Clowes in my apartment, and, indeed I did: Mister Wonderful. And it is wonderful.
Clowes is older (even in 2011), and so is his protagonist Marshall. No worries, so am I! Marshall is somewhat of a misanthrope but also self-loathing, so it balances out. And he's divorced and it's been a while, if you don't count the sketchy prostitute he's spent some time with. Friends Tim and Yuki (judgmental, condescending friends, we later learn) set Marshall up on a blind date with Natalie. And this book is basically the story of that date.
It's short, it's sweet, it's bitter, it's hopeful, and it resents itself for being hopeful. But... just maybe?
The wide format allows for a few great two-page spreads -- one is just a sound effect that I read over and over because it made me laugh. But I love that Clowes has the luxury here to spread out his art, give us a little pause when he wants to.
Mister Wonderful is classic Clowes that gave me a hankering for even more Clowes (Clowes-ure?). So I was pumped to learn a book came out in 2016, Patience, which I am impatient to read.
Clowes is older (even in 2011), and so is his protagonist Marshall. No worries, so am I! Marshall is somewhat of a misanthrope but also self-loathing, so it balances out. And he's divorced and it's been a while, if you don't count the sketchy prostitute he's spent some time with. Friends Tim and Yuki (judgmental, condescending friends, we later learn) set Marshall up on a blind date with Natalie. And this book is basically the story of that date.
It's short, it's sweet, it's bitter, it's hopeful, and it resents itself for being hopeful. But... just maybe?
The wide format allows for a few great two-page spreads -- one is just a sound effect that I read over and over because it made me laugh. But I love that Clowes has the luxury here to spread out his art, give us a little pause when he wants to.
Mister Wonderful is classic Clowes that gave me a hankering for even more Clowes (Clowes-ure?). So I was pumped to learn a book came out in 2016, Patience, which I am impatient to read.
August 20, 2021
Absolutamente perfeito! Amo o estilo visual do Daniel Clowes e essa história me pegou de jeito. O ritmo é muito bem pensado; absolutamente o tempo todo consegui me identificar com o personagem principal e seus pensamentos que não param de tomar o protagonismo diante das conversas e situações. Pude me ver e lembrar de estar em situações muito próximas e com os mesmos questionamentos que mais atrapalham do que ajudam. Uma história muito cotidiana, humana e comum... Só queria que tivesse uma edição brasileira, definitivamente estaria na minha prateleira de favoritos.
May 12, 2025
Achingly sad, raw, and real. Not a person I'd want to know, but these two do seem like they're perfect for each other until they aren't any longer and I hope it works out for them, but it doesn't matter after turning the last page.
Hated the interior monologue blocking the speech bubbles until I loved it. Could have used something like a Fleabag direct address to drop us into it a little smoother, and lost the Great Gazoo guy that popped up twice. Whatever, still works whether you have to get warmed up or not.
Hated the interior monologue blocking the speech bubbles until I loved it. Could have used something like a Fleabag direct address to drop us into it a little smoother, and lost the Great Gazoo guy that popped up twice. Whatever, still works whether you have to get warmed up or not.
February 18, 2019
This book was a very funny insight into our minds when we're with other people and our internal monologging. I enjoyed the story a lot!
September 13, 2021
Daniel Clowes is great. This isn't really one of his better ones. Nice shape though. I like the wide-angle format!
April 26, 2023
Very anti-climatic but also somehow anti-any feeling
January 30, 2024
Minor Clowes but effective.
February 29, 2024
I pretty much enjoy everything Clowes does, but I especially like his more grounded and mundane stories, like this and Wilson.
April 2, 2024
2,5-3 estrelles
Vhjfhnbg un overthinker overthinking constantment (massa siusplau q algú li pari els peus)
Vhjfhnbg un overthinker overthinking constantment (massa siusplau q algú li pari els peus)
January 22, 2018
¿Pasó ya la época de los autores deprimentes autoficcionándose o haciendo creer que su vida es tan deprimente como la que ilustran en sus obras?
No sé.
Posiblemente.
No sé.
Posiblemente.
October 16, 2017
Wunderbarer Comic, der in die Kategorie "Würde ich gern besitzen" fällt. Eine Blind-Date- und Liebesgeschichte über einen Mann mittleren Alters voller Selbstzweifel und eine 35-jährige Dame namens Natalie, die mit ihren eigenen schlechten Liebeserfahrungen zu kämpfen hat. Wie die anderen Clowes-Werke in einem charmant-anachronistischen 50er- und 60er-Jahre Comicstil gehalten, aber in der Gegenwart spielend.
Die Buchausgabe ist wirklich gelungen und selbst das Vorsatzpapier mit seinen witzigen kleinen Zeichnungen ist schön und passt wunderbar zum Titel des Comics. Das Buch ist in einem ungewöhnlichen, schmalen Queerformat gehalten und weicht damit von dem konventionellen Quadratformat des "New York Times Magazine"-Comicstrips (2007 bis 2008 dort erschienen) ab.
Witzig, emphatisch und geschickt mit dem Medium Comic umgehend, ist "Mr. Wonderful" ein Werk zu dem ich sicher noch öfter zurückkommen werde.
Die Buchausgabe ist wirklich gelungen und selbst das Vorsatzpapier mit seinen witzigen kleinen Zeichnungen ist schön und passt wunderbar zum Titel des Comics. Das Buch ist in einem ungewöhnlichen, schmalen Queerformat gehalten und weicht damit von dem konventionellen Quadratformat des "New York Times Magazine"-Comicstrips (2007 bis 2008 dort erschienen) ab.
Witzig, emphatisch und geschickt mit dem Medium Comic umgehend, ist "Mr. Wonderful" ein Werk zu dem ich sicher noch öfter zurückkommen werde.
February 14, 2020
A fun read looking at re-entering the dating world after a previous relationship has ended. There's baggage....lots of it. There's uncertainty and questions: how much should one reveal and when? how honest should one be? There insecurity about looks and appearance.
The graphics were well done and added to the storyline.
I enjoyed this book quite a bit.
The graphics were well done and added to the storyline.
I enjoyed this book quite a bit.
August 8, 2016
As a fan of every book (and the adaptation of "Ghost World") this author has written, it came as a crushing disappointment that "Mister Wonderful" is simply awful. The narrator has no traits to admire and that is the point but unlike in other Clowes stories, this existentialism feels false and chic, the whole white guy in glasses bemoaning that no one loves him while giving no one a reason to engage with him. Our protagonist for no reason (other than he can see himself homeless one day) hates the poor (and the rich), and also brushes off his date's eating disorder as, "yeah, well, it only lasted about 2 years in the 80's" as if that is nothing. What is nothing, is Natalie, the female love interest who is not a character so much as a man's projected fantasy of the blandest next-door neighbour type chick who does not exist. Natalie's motivations are not believable by any stretch of the imagination and believe me I was trying to enjoy this comic but I just hated it - take the great Seymour from "Ghost World" remove all the charm and the humour and you have Mister Wonderful - scratch that, that is not even fair to Seymour, this is a comic book without characters or ideas and I don't understand how Mr. Clowes thinks he can get away with crap like this simply because he inserts one clever device (the internal monologue we all have during social dates) and his dismissal of people is astounding - take for instance the opening third, where our protagonist waits for his date and a women his age, not the younger blonde, Natalie, but someone his age no older no younger and he goes on about, "Please don't let this be my date", how can we possibly be expected to follow this story to the end and not wish doctor's were not being so tight-assed about benzodiazapines these days because this is one experience that will piss any person with sense off while comforting uppity yuppies who think they are virtuous simply by "caring" about environmental issues.
September 9, 2016
If you’re more inclined to enjoy graphic novels of the Everyman rather than Superman, then you might want to check out some books by Daniel Clowes. Clowes is responsible for superbly getting it right about pseudo-intellectual, angsty teenagers faced with graduating into adulthood in his 1998 graphic novel, Ghost World. The 2001 movie stars Thora Birch, Scarlett Johansson, and Steve Buscemi.
Clowes’ newest graphic novel is Mister Wonderful, a woe-is-me tale that takes place the evening of a blind date between a broken middle-aged man and woman who have little self-esteem and a lot of baggage. Before becoming a book, Mister Wonderful was a serialized comic strip in The New York Times Magazine.
Marshall had a “shockingly happy” childhood, but adulthood hasn’t been so kind to him. His wife slept around with all but one of his friends—the “but one” being the man who set him up on the date—so in the end he had neither wife nor friends. After a six-year dry spell he took up with a crank addict who robbed him blind, and now here he is, waiting for the woman of his dreams who is 49 minutes late.
What's interesting about dates arranged by friends is that some of the inspiration that spurs a couple on to see the date through comes from knowing that there must be a good reason that your friends thought you would be perfect for one another. There is an interlude in the middle of Mister Wonderful where we humorously see that's not the case for Tim (Marshall's friend) and his wife, Yuki (Natalie's friend).
Marshall is so used to living inside his own head that his thought boxes have overtaken his life, even covering up the voice of his Ms. Right. The evening unfolds about how you’d think it would.
If you're feeling low and in the mood for some schadenfreude, then Mister Wonderful just might cheer you up.
Clowes’ newest graphic novel is Mister Wonderful, a woe-is-me tale that takes place the evening of a blind date between a broken middle-aged man and woman who have little self-esteem and a lot of baggage. Before becoming a book, Mister Wonderful was a serialized comic strip in The New York Times Magazine.
Marshall had a “shockingly happy” childhood, but adulthood hasn’t been so kind to him. His wife slept around with all but one of his friends—the “but one” being the man who set him up on the date—so in the end he had neither wife nor friends. After a six-year dry spell he took up with a crank addict who robbed him blind, and now here he is, waiting for the woman of his dreams who is 49 minutes late.
What's interesting about dates arranged by friends is that some of the inspiration that spurs a couple on to see the date through comes from knowing that there must be a good reason that your friends thought you would be perfect for one another. There is an interlude in the middle of Mister Wonderful where we humorously see that's not the case for Tim (Marshall's friend) and his wife, Yuki (Natalie's friend).
Marshall is so used to living inside his own head that his thought boxes have overtaken his life, even covering up the voice of his Ms. Right. The evening unfolds about how you’d think it would.
If you're feeling low and in the mood for some schadenfreude, then Mister Wonderful just might cheer you up.
September 19, 2011
(Reprinted from the Chicago Center for Literature and Photography [cclapcenter.com]. I am the original author of this essay, as well as the owner of CCLaP; it is not being reprinted illegally.)
I've been a big fan of comics artist Daniel Clowes since around issue #5 or so of his originally self-published Eightball, and have tried to be a regular reader of all his work ever since then; but while I'm a great admirer of his darkly surreal, more narrative work like Ghost World or David Boring, I confess that I've always had a low tolerance for the other type of work Clowes regularly does, which can only be described as pointless exercises in neurotic masturbation, which back in Eightball thankfully usually limited itself to little four- or eight-page fillers at the ends of occasional issues. And that's what makes his new Mister Wonderful so unfortunate, because it's eighty entire pages of this masturbatory material, a literal one-joke gag about a balding schlub who endlessly worries over several hundred thought bubbles that his blind date is too attractive and witty for him. And with this originally being published serially in The New York Times Sunday Magazine last year, that makes it doubly unfortunate, because that makes this the only exposure to Clowes that many of the Updike-loving crowd over there is ever going to get, which means it's going to be harder than ever to convince these people to take comics seriously. I mean, kudos to Clowes for adding another impressive-looking hardback book to his publishing oeuvre; but for fans of his who are patiently waiting for another masterpiece like Velvet Glove, it's recommended that they skip this trifle altogether.
Out of 10: 7.0
I've been a big fan of comics artist Daniel Clowes since around issue #5 or so of his originally self-published Eightball, and have tried to be a regular reader of all his work ever since then; but while I'm a great admirer of his darkly surreal, more narrative work like Ghost World or David Boring, I confess that I've always had a low tolerance for the other type of work Clowes regularly does, which can only be described as pointless exercises in neurotic masturbation, which back in Eightball thankfully usually limited itself to little four- or eight-page fillers at the ends of occasional issues. And that's what makes his new Mister Wonderful so unfortunate, because it's eighty entire pages of this masturbatory material, a literal one-joke gag about a balding schlub who endlessly worries over several hundred thought bubbles that his blind date is too attractive and witty for him. And with this originally being published serially in The New York Times Sunday Magazine last year, that makes it doubly unfortunate, because that makes this the only exposure to Clowes that many of the Updike-loving crowd over there is ever going to get, which means it's going to be harder than ever to convince these people to take comics seriously. I mean, kudos to Clowes for adding another impressive-looking hardback book to his publishing oeuvre; but for fans of his who are patiently waiting for another masterpiece like Velvet Glove, it's recommended that they skip this trifle altogether.
Out of 10: 7.0
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